Iraqi coalition 'enters Mosul for first time' in fight to recapture city from Isis

Iraqi troops have reportedly entered the Karama district of the city of Mosul, the first advance into the Isis stronghold following two weeks of slow but steady advances by US-backed coalition forces.

An Iraqi army official said the elite Counter Terrorism Service had managed to enter the city’s outskirts on Monday despite heavy fire from militants and was moving in on Gogjali, an industrial zone about a kilometre away from Mosul’s administrative border.

Two units are said to have captured Bazwaya - the last village before Mosul itself - in a dawn offensive with help from coalition air strikes, despite mortar and small arms fire. At one point, a Humvee packed with explosives raced ahead in an attempt to ram the forces, but Iraqi troops opened fire on it, setting off the charge and blowing up the vehicle, Brigadier General Haider Fadhil told Reuters.

Some residents in newly liberated Bazwaya hung white flags from their windows, as troops requested citizens stay inside as soldiers cleared the streets of landmines.

Iraqi forces have been edging closer to the huge Isis-controlled city over two weeks of fighting, retaking militant-held villages on the Nineveh Plain on four different fronts despite counterattacks on other cities and the use of suicide bombs and landmines by Isis.

“The operation to liberate the left bank of Mosul has started,” a military statement said, referring to the eastern bank of the river that flows through the north to the south of the city.

Elsewhere in the battle on Monday, Kurdish Peshmerga forces made gains to the north, clearing five villages of Isis fighters.

Iran-backed Shiite militias also joined the assault over the weekend, pushing south of the city from Saturday. Gains have been slower on the southern front, where coalition forces are still some 12 miles (20 kilometres) away.

“The battle of Mosul will not be a picnic,” Hadi al-Amiri, leader of the Badr Organisation, the largest Shi'ite militia fighting with Iraqi government forces, said from the southern frontline.

“We are prepared… even if it lasts for months.”

Also on Monday, revenge attacks killed at least eight civilians in Baghdad in the latest in several retaltiation attacks claimed by Isis, mainly in Shiite neighbourhoods.

Defeat in Mosul will effectively spell the end of Isis as a land-holding force in Iraq, and is expected to send fighters retreating to Isis’ de facto capital of Raqqa in northern Syria.

Aid groups are worried about the potential consequences for Mosul’s 1.5million strong civilian population which is at risk because of the fighting. Reports cited by the UN say that hundreds of people have been executed or taken as human shields as Isis digs in for the final battle to defend the city.

Around 3,000 - 5,000 fighters are thought to be well-prepared for battle with an extensive network of tunnels and boobytrapped roads and bridges.

Between 200,000 - 700,000 people are expected to flee now that fighting has reached the city outskirts, putting pressure on Iraq's already overstretched resources for the 3.4million people already displaced in the country.